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One week. I could do that.
“Okay, fine. You can come with me, but that means we’re going to have to take this beast with us.” I patted my dog’s stomach and tried to push him off the couch. He wouldn’t budge.
“Max is good people. He’ll love it down in Rose Town.”
“Ridge!”
“Rose Ridge! Right, sorry.” She winced, but her mouth tipped with laughter.
I shoved her with my foot, but it made Max shift as well, forcing his tail to whip around and nail me in the face.
“Ow! Maxwell!”
Laura laughed, and I pushed her off the couch.
“This is going to be fun.”
SIX
WES
AGE 13
My school yearwas officially over. Being homeschooled had a few perks, and ending a whole week before the public school was always one of them. Usually, I was already busy with fishing and swimming, but this year, I found myself riding my bike down to Rose Ridge Middle School.
Red brick surrounded the one-story school, guarded by a chain-link fence. A few trees were spaced out along the property, edging around the parking lot. I rode, watching the double doors for students. The bell rang, and kids streamed out the doors. There were so many faces I didn’t recognize.
How could I live here my entire life and not know any kids my own age? I knew the kids from the homeschool group, but most of them were from a different county. That left the girl who still snuck into my treehouse on hot summer nights when her dad’s clubhouse got too wild. Her visits were becoming less frequent—at least they were last summer. The first time she popped in wasn’t until July, and we only had a few times to hang out before school started up again.
I didn’t particularly like it.
Which was why I was here, inserting myself into Callie’s summer so she had no other choice but to talk to me on my terms and not hers.
I waited on the curb outside as guys my age came out, pushing, laughing, and joking. Girls came, too. They all wore shorts so small I could see all the way up their legs to the crease of their butt cheeks. It made my face heat, for some reason. Maybe because girls didn’t dress like that in the homeschool groups, or at church…
Still, none of these girls were Callie, so I didn’t really care.
I waited until I saw that glossy dark hair, and that familiar expression. Her pink lips always tugged down, like she was thinking about something sad. Her hazel eyes focused on the ground as she walked, until she reached the bike rack.
She didn’t even put a lock around hers, which, with how much rust was on it, didn’t surprise me. I watched her every move, especially how she looked in real clothes. Every time I had ever seen her, she was wearing an oversized T-shirt. Now, she wore shorts that went just as high as the other girls, but on her they looked different.Better.
That firecracker-in-my-chest feeling came back as I took in the shirt hanging off her shoulder, revealing more skin on her than I had ever seen. Her long hair hung down her back in a slick sheet of silk, and a horrifying realization settled in my chest: she was breathtakingly beautiful.
Callie walked her bike along the sidewalk, away from the school and toward me. My throat suddenly felt dry, and my face felt too warm. It was hot out, but not that hot…it was still only May.
How had I not noticed it before, how stunning she was? It was like I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Perhaps that was why I didn’t care if the other girls wore shorts, because Callie was all I could see.
My hands sweated on the handlebars of my bike as I held it up. Callie didn’t see me yet, but she would as soon as she cleared the gate. Panicked anxiety made my mind spin with ideas of what I would say to her.
Hey, how was school?
No, that would be stupid.
Nice to see you outside of the treehouse. You look really pretty in the daylight.
I blushed, hating myself for feeling so anxious. She was just Callie the tree house girl, nothing special about her.
But then some guy my age ran up next to her and covered her hands with his on the handlebars, and suddenly shewasn’tjust Callie. She was the girl I was supposed to keep safe. The one who trusted me to give her a place to sleep. The one who smiled when I told her Disney stories and acted like they’d really happened.
